Sir Sean Connery famously played James Bond in six official 007 movies in Dr No, From Russia with Love, Goldfinger, Thunderball, You Only Live Twice and Diamonds Are Forever.
The latter saw him return to the role in 1971 after his replacement, George Lazenby, turned down more 007 movies following his only outing in 1969’s On Her Majesty’s Secret Service.
Connery was paid a record $1.25 million salary plus two movies of his choice to come back after producers failed to find a new Bond.
Yet in 1983, the star would play Bond again on the big screen in the unofficial outing Never Say Never Again. That same year, the Thunderball remake went up against Roger Moore’s Octopussy.
It may surprise some Bond fans to hear that Connery did, in fact, play Bond a couple more times after this.
Firstly he portrayed 007 in a video message for future M Ralph Fiennes on his birthday. The two actors were co-starring in 1998 flop The Avengers at the time. However, just a few years later he voiced Bond once more for the 2005 video game version of From Russia with Love. Connery was living in The Bahamas at the time at agreed to record the voiceover at Compass Point Studios in Nassau with audio engineer Terry Manning.
Express.co.uk spoke previously with Bond expert Mark Edlitz, author of The Many Lives of James Bond and The Lost Adventures of James Bond, who shared the story. He said: “One day after Connery recorded his lines, the audio engineer checked the tape. However, the engineer didn’t hear the star’s voice during playback. For some reason, Connery’s entire day’s work was missing. Blank.”
Manning phoned up the EA Games producer who was panicking but reassured them that he’d be able to sort it out. Luckily, the audio engineer had worked with the original 007 star for many years so knew he could count on the Bond star. Edlitz said: “The engineer called Connery and the actor came back and recorded the entire day’s work without charge. It was a generous thing to do. Incidentally, the reason that Connery played Bond again was that his grandchildren loved video games and he thought it would appeal to them. Very sweet.”
Edlitz added: “If you take out the gameplay and just put together the animated scenes you have the start of a James Bond animated movie.” At the time, Connery said of reprising Bond for the From Russia with Love video game: “As an artist, I see this as another way to explore the creative process. Video games are an extremely popular form of entertainment today and I am looking forward to seeing how it all fits together.”
Mark Edlitz’s books The Many Lives of James Bond and The Lost Adventures of James Bond are out now.
